


Soul Bonding

by Jag_Erin



Series: Stronger Together [2]
Category: The Strain (TV), The Strain Trilogy - Guillermo del Toro & Chuck Hogan
Genre: Asexual Character, Fighting, Gun Violence, Platonic Relationships, Platonic Soulmates, Sun Hunters - Freeform, Training, Trans Character, Vaun is born, strigoi
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-08-25
Updated: 2019-08-25
Packaged: 2020-09-26 17:21:46
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 3
Words: 4,951
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20393359
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Jag_Erin/pseuds/Jag_Erin
Summary: Charlie doesn't want to be a pawn in someone else's war. After bonding with the Born named Vaun, she seeks to escape New York and the Ancients with him in tow thinking they can out run the disaster.





	1. Chapter 1

“You shouldn’t get that close to him. When he wakes, he’s going to be hungry. He will attack you.”

Charlie shot a glare over her shoulder before looking back at the bed, “He won’t do that.”

“Because you know him so well?” 

She had decided she didn’t like this one. He was pushy and rude, but not in the same ways that Vaun had been. With Vaun, it had seemed like he had at least been reluctant to do it at times. Like he was just doing it because he had to do it. Because it was what was for the best. Not this one. He did it because he wanted to do it. It wasn’t always what was for the best, it was simply how he interacted with people. That was his personality and Charlie didn’t like it. It reminded her of her father.

He hadn’t introduced himself when they first met, but the situation hardly called for introductions. The doctors at the lab had finally allowed her to be unrestrained from her bed, but she was still trapped in the same room as Vaun and he was still strapped to his bed. She spent a lot of time sitting next to his bed and just talking to him. Vaun responded at first, but as the days went on, he stopped doing that. By the time this one showed up, he wasn’t even moving anymore. His body still felt warm, so she didn’t think he was dead. 

Charlie had heard the commotion going on outside of their room, but she couldn’t pry the door open. When it suddenly opened from the outside, she had nearly fallen backwards. She could tell right away that the man who walked in was the same as Vaun. He wasn’t one of the others or like the ones on the streets. He’d asked if she was Charlie and when she confirmed, he tried to haul her out of the room by her arm.

She’d refused to leave without Vaun. He kept telling her that there was no point in taking him. It occurred to her at that moment that this was Vaun’s brother. He hadn’t told her much about his brother, but she knew enough to know that there weren’t many of them like himself. Like Vaun, he had a nose, his eyes were different, and his skin was marbled. He had said he was there to get her, not him. 

Eventually, he relented when he realized she wouldn’t go without Vaun. 

That had been several days ago. Vaun still wasn’t responsive. His brother, who eventually said his name was Quinlan, told her it was useless to keep sitting there with him. Charlie didn’t care though. It was Vaun who had got the doctors to stop injecting her with things. He said if they stopped and let her stay with him, he wouldn’t fight them anymore when they came to collect his blood. He had saved her continued pain and humiliation. The least she could do was sit by his side until he woke up.

“He’s not mindless, like those others. You know that. He’s like you.”

“And you think I have the control not to behave like an animal sometimes?” the tone of his voice sent a shiver down her spine, “He will wake and he will drain you without hesitation. They were only feeding him to keep him alive, they were not feeding him to satisfy his hunger. He will do what all animals do. He will feed to satisfy and when he’s finished, when his mind returns, he will regret his actions. Actions that can be prevented if you just stay away.”

Charlie had been fighting with him about this since they got here. He said that he wasn’t interested in what happened to Vaun, that he had only gone to the lab because he was looking for her. He needed sun hunters and there were only two that had been trained. Charlie felt like he was lying, at least a little bit. He could have left Charlie there to die with Vaun. He could have carried her out against her will. He could have forcibly removed her from the room and locked it so she couldn’t be here. There were a number of things he could have done, but he hadn’t. 

“He’s not like me. We have very little in common after what they did to him. We share a similar birth, but we are not the same,” Charlie knew that. Vaun had been infected and Quinlan had not, “You know nothing about him.”

Her eyes shot a glare at him again, “Because you know him so well?” she had said that to him more than once.

“I trained him.”

“And you abandoned him.”

His pale blue eyes narrowed at her, “If he ever wakes, he will need food. I had a supply I can give him, but it will be useless if you’re laying on the floor drained. Leave him be. Sitting there, coddling him, isn’t going to make him wake any faster. I trained him for a reason. He trained you for a reason. Don’t let his and my work go to waste because you feel like you need to be a good _friend_. There are things that need to be done and you are prohibiting them from being done by sitting here.”

“What if he wakes up alone?”

She twitched as she felt his gloved hand slide onto her shoulder and grip a little, “Then it will be a normal day for all of us. Come on.”

Charlie wanted to ignore him or fight with him again. To just keep sitting here holding Vaun’s hand and hoping he would wake up. Leaving him felt wrong, but knew Quinlan was right. Things were still going to hell. It was ten times worse than it had been before. These things were taking over faster and faster everyday. It was stupid to think that her alone could make a difference, but she knew there was a lot at play here. The ones Vaun spoke for were still out there and likely continuing their own plans. Quinlan didn’t seem friendly with them, but he seemed to have a similar goal in mind.

Sighing softly, she relented finally. The same way Quinlan had at her insistence that he take Vaun with them. Charlie let his hand go and set it down on the bed beside him. Climbing to her feet, she followed Quinlan from the room and closed the door behind her.

“What’s the next step?” she had no reason to small talk with him.

“To recruit.”

“Recruit what?”

“More people,” Quinlan was a little more talkative than Vaun was in the beginning. She wondered if that was a perk of not being infected, “I found Gus. He knows somewhere to find more people to join us,” he had mentioned finding Gus when he found her. She had told him all she knew was that he said he lived in Harlem before getting picked up. She had asked Vaun what he thought had happened with Gus while they were still in the lab. Vaun said that the other man was resourceful and likely still alive. Apparently he was right, “He did ask for compensation though, in exchange for assisting me.”

That seemed odd to bring up right now, “So?”

“What are you expecting to get out of this? Money?”

Charlie stared at him for a moment. She wasn’t sure what to say, “I don’t expect anything from anyone.”

“Everyone expects something.”

“...I want you to tell those three old fucks that they’re still paying my medical bills and I want them to let Vaun go when this is over.”

He cocked his head at her and looked her over a little, “Are you in love with him? Because if you are, you should find a way to make it stop. It won’t end well if you are focused on him. It will only get the both of you killed. Most likely you first.”

Charlie felt her cheeks warm up at the accusation, “Excuse me? Love him? That’s insane.”

“Not as insane as you might think it is. You people have romanticized the loving of monsters for centuries,” her face got hotter, “If you love him, you’re of no use to me.”

“I don’t love him. It’s not his fault he was born as what he is anymore than it being my fault for being born the way I was. The one person who was helping me is gone. I killed him. Because those things got to him. It's not easy having no one. He told me you tried to stop them from infecting him when he was born. Now you can use me as a chance to try to give him whatever sort of life you had tried to give him before. Sure, it won’t change the damage that might have already been done to him, but better late than never. It’s never too late to start becoming who you should be.”

Quinlan’s eyes were cold and hard. It made her feel uneasy the way he looked at her.

“Very well. I will mention it to them. I cannot promise they will listen. They aren’t very good at that.”

“All you can do is try,” he looked at her in that way that put her on edge again, “Stop that.”

“Stop what?”

“Looking at me like that. I don’t like it.”

He broke his eye contact on her and turned away, “Come on. We have work to do.”


	2. Chapter 2

“Long time no see, Chica.”

She rolled her eyes as she climbed into the bus, “It’s Charlie. It’s not been that long.”

“I thought you died.”

“I thought I would too,” she tossed her pack into the seat behind the driver's seat, “Where did you get a school bus?”

He smirked and shrugged, “Q got it for us. Gotta have transportation for the troops. By the way, that’s Angel.”

She followed his pointing hand to see a man sitting a few seats away from them. He was older with a bit of a facial hair. He was silent and staring out the window, wrapped in a black leather jacket. She walked down the row of seats to him, “I’m Charlie.”

Angel’s eyes looked tired. Not from lack of sleep, but from life in general, “Angel. I would say it’s nice to meet you, but…”

“Circumstances. I get it. All I need to know is that you have my back,” he was a comrade, not a friend. Basically co-workers.

“As much as you’ll have mine.”

“Good. Then we’ll have no problems.”

“I like a lady that knows what she wants,” which earned him a small smirk from her before she headed back up to sit behind Gus’s seat.

“So what’s the plan? Our new fearless leader didn’t say much.”

“Gonna go pick up some guys,” she nudged him a bit in the shoulder to continue when he didn’t give her more information, “Only one place I know to get guys who won’t say no to something like this and might be uninfected.”

“Where’s that?”

“Prison.”

Charlie spent the trip watching out the window with Angel. The city had gone to hell. It was beyond looting and usual illegal activities. People were just trying to survive now. People looked scared, the few that she saw. She wondered what the rest of the country looked like. Had they been left to fend for themselves and cut off from the rest of the world? Or were there people fighting and failing? Palmer was obviously still in play. She knew that he was the one funding the lab Vaun and she had been trapped in.

A prison was one of the last places she wanted to go, but it made sense. So long as everything was kept locked down, there was a chance that the prisoners would actually stay safe so long as they could continue getting a food and water source. It wasn’t as if Charlie had a clean slate. She had done a number of illegal things. She smoked pot, she had a fake identity, and she had been a prostitute. She had never pushed it though. The identity thing was probably the only one she felt would get her in any kind of real trouble. 

Her father always told her that people could smell the military on him. She had never been in any of the services, but she was raised around it her whole life up until she ran away from home. Friends, the few that she had, commented that she did kind of have a military vibe. Charlie wasn’t so sure walking into a prison was the best place for her to be, “I’ll keep the bus running. I don’t think I should go in there.”

Gus seemed surprised by her comment, but he nodded, “Probably right. These dudes ain’t seen a girl in fuck knows how long. When we come out, if you don’t see me and Angel up front, get the hell out of here.”

“Works for me,” and she had no problem with that.

They left and she climbed up into the front seat with the gun and knife Quinlan had given her. He was a lot less open with information about what they were doing. She’d prodded him, but he hadn’t relented. Like Vaun, she imagined he was going to wait until the last minute to tell her what exactly they would be doing. It gave her less chances to back out unless she backed out right away. Chances were that she would talk herself into it like she had the last time. That’s likely what he was counting on.

Her mind drifted back to Vaun. She had sat next to him for a long time in the lab. Holding his hand and talking to him. There were times when she would lay her head down on his stomach and fall asleep until one of the doctors came in. It wasn’t love. It was comfort. Vaun was hardly her friend, but they were in it together. A close comfort was, well, comforting. 

There were times when he would say things about himself that didn’t relate to his connection to the others. Things that were about him and him alone. One time, he admitted to regretting not going to see a movie. That he had the chance to, but never did. It was something simple. Charlie couldn’t help but smile and promise him that if they got out of that place, she would take him to see a movie. She had made all kinds of promises like that to him. If everything turned out okay in the end, she would be able to keep those promises.

A loud bang on the bus door made her jump and scream a little. She came out of her thoughts and saw Gus at the door. There was a crowd of rough looking guys behind him and Angel. Charlie wasn’t scared of them. She had lived in a crappy apartment in a rough neighborhood. She dealt with guys like that on a nightly basis at the restaurant. It wasn’t the fact that they were there that made her feel nervous. It was the number of them. They all looked tired, hungry, and angry. 

It was just her, Gus, and Angel. If these guys decided to turn against them, there would be no way to stop them all. In truth, she wasn’t sure how well she trusted Gus and Angel yet. One didn’t survive by blindly trusting people.

Charlie could have turned the bus on and drove off, leaving them there. What she would do at that point, she wasn’t sure. That wasn’t the best option though. So, slowly, she opened the door. If she left now, she couldn’t go back to get Vaun. She had her doubts that Quinlan would be pleased with her decision.

Angel got on first, standing just behind her with his arms crossed and watching each of the men as they climbed on next. A few of them looked her over. Nothing she wasn’t used to. She made sure they saw the gun in her lap that she had her hand on, “Keep moving, Asshole,” she snipped at one of them.

“I know you,” he said back, “You worked that shit hole diner in Hunts Point.”

“Yeah. What of it?”

“Nothin’. Just heard some shit ‘bout you.”

Charlie didn’t like the way he was looking at her. There were a number of people who knew about her. She didn’t make a habit of going around and telling people, but word got around whether she wanted it to or not. A bad breakup could spread gossip faster than anything else. That’s why she had been single for the last few years. 

Before she could say anything else, Angel took a step forward, “Keep moving,” as much as she wanted to thank him when the guy walked off down the bus, she didn’t. She couldn’t show that she was grateful for his help in front of them. It would have to be a private moment later one.

“Let’s move out,” Gus said as he climbed on last and she shut the door behind him.

The drive back was much quicker than the drive there. Likely because Charlie was going faster than Gus had been. She wasted no time in getting off and starting back into the building before the men could even get moving. 

Quinlan caught her in the hallway and grabbed her arm as she tried to brush past him, “Where are you going?”

“Upstairs. It doesn’t matter what you say to them. I’m already involved in this and I have no intentions of backing out now. I have no interest in hanging around them anymore than I have to.”

“He’s not awake,” she felt her cheeks warm, “I meant it before when I said that you loving him makes you useless to me.”

“I guess it’s a good thing I’m not in love with him then, right? Can your kind even feel love?” she snapped, “Maybe if you think this is such an issue that you need to keep bringing it up, I should just go ahead and leave. If all you need is raw numbers, then me taking my already trained ass out of here shouldn’t matter to you. Right?”

He didn’t seem caught off guard, but he did let go of her arm, “Don’t stay with him too long. If he wakes…”

“I know. He’ll kill me. I’ve been informed. Go deal with your men. They sound like they’re getting a little rowdy.”

Charlie could feel his eyes boring into the back of her head as she started off away from him. She tried not to let it get to her, but it sent a shiver down her spine.


	3. Chapter 3

“Again! Faster!”

Charlie fell to her knees taking deep, fast breaths, “I...I can’t…” she huffed out before rolling to the floor and onto her back, sprawling out. Her body demanded she stay there. Her lungs were burning and every muscle in her body felt pulled tight and raw. She felt like she would throw up if there was anything in her stomach. Thankfully there wasn’t anything in there. So all she could do was gag a little as her breathing evened out.

“Get up.”

“Fuck...you...asshole…” she gasped out as she closed her eyes. Charlie had no intentions on getting up any time soon.

Quinlan had dragged her out of Vaun’s room early that morning for training. It wasn’t that she couldn’t handle a little early morning training, but it was the intensity and length of the session that was getting to her. He laid into her hard. It was different from training with Vaun. There were similarities. They both barked orders and they both a stern tone about it. The difference was that Quinlan didn’t seem to care for her wellbeing. It didn’t matter that she had pushed herself too far and needed to rest. All he cared about results and if he wasn’t getting the results he wanted, he got angry.

“Get up.”

“I said, if you didn’t hear it before, fuck you,” he didn’t care that she had just spent several weeks locked up in a lab room, strapped to a bed most of the time, and being injected with fuck knows what. That her body was worse off than it was when Vaun had found her. She was malnourished and running on very little sleep.

It didn’t help that she had been off her medication since the day they had tried to kill Palmer. While the lack of medicine wouldn’t kill her, it did have an effect on her body. It made her body and mind respond differently, like it had when she had first started it. She could feel it all over. It wasn’t like all the work she had gone through over the years would be undone by a few months off her meds, but it just felt strange and she didn’t like it. Charlie knew there were more important things happening in the world and her comfort was the least important thing right now. But it was hard to ignore.

Her eyes shot open as she felt herself being hauled up by the front of her shirt. She stumbled to her feet and nearly fell backwards as he let go when she was nearly upright, “Pick up your knife.”

“No.”

“Then fight without it,” without warning, he attacked. He threw her back and she went limp as she hit the wall. The breath knocked out of her lungs as she collapsed back to the ground, “Get up and fight. You think they are going to wait for you to feel ready?”

“Stop it!” she snapped as she caught her breath again, “I’m not like you! I can’t keep doing this!”

Quinlan grabbed her again and pulled her to her feet, holding her close to his face, “But you will be like them if you don’t learn to push through the pain.”

She threw her hands out, shoving him back. Charlie knew he only moved back because he wanted to. He’d already proven she couldn’t make him move if he didn’t want to, “I know!” he reminded her of her father and it made her dislike him more and more every day, “It’s been six fucking hours though! I need a break! I need food! I need water! I’m a goddamn human, not a machine!”

“And I am?”

“Yes! Yes you are! You don’t eat or drink and I don’t even think you sleep...I’m taking a break or I’m just leaving. Your choice.”

Quinlan eyed her for a minute. She had threatened to leave several times. He hadn’t called her out on it yet. She had started to wonder at what point she would break him on that. Charlie hadn’t decided yet what would happen when he did. If she stayed, he would walk all over her. If she left, she would be on her own and not likely survive long. Charlie figured it would be an in the moment decision.

“Thirty minutes,” he turned fast after saying it and started out of the room.

“Hey!” she called out, “You doing this kind of training with all of us or are you just being a prick to me?”

“Just you.”

As annoying as it was to hear, she wasn’t all that surprised. She hadn’t seen Gus around much and she hadn’t seen any of the guys they got out of the jail. It had only been a few days since then, but she had thought things would happen quicker than this. Apparently it wasn’t, “Why?”

“There have been many sun hunters throughout history. Anyone can do it, but sometimes one is different. They take to it better. You’re one of them. I would rather you not meet the same fate as the others like yourself. I have no desire to take your head off like I had to the last one. Take your break, but don’t expect me to go easy on you when you get back.”

She would have had some kind of quip back about him going easy on her, but she was a little caught off guard by the previous comments. They were, borderline, complimentary. Almost, but not quite, was better than nothing. Instead, she stared at the back of his head as he walked off, hoping it would bother him the way it did her when he did it. Charlie doubted it though. He wasn’t one to be put off easily. 

Even though he kept telling her to stay away from Vaun, Charlie kept going back to him. She felt more comfortable with him than she did anyone else around here. Not that there were many other people. Occasionally she saw Gus, Angel, or one of the guys; but she didn’t feel comfortable being around them. Quinlan, Gus, and Angel really didn’t bother her much. Quinlan annoyed her, but he mostly ignored her unless he was dragging her through some sparring session. Gus gave her a little nod when they saw each other. Angel did about the same. It was mostly the guys they had picked up that got under her skin.

A few gave her looks that made her feel uncomfortable, but she had dealt with that her whole life. Others looked at her with disgust, again, she was used to that. Honestly, nothing they said or did was unknown to her. She’d managed with it forever. It was just uncomfortable that she might have to work with them in some way. If it was anything like what Vaun had planned, there was a chance it would go horribly wrong. She might not get lucky enough to survive a second time. She didn’t trust these guys to have her back.

So she retreated back to Vaun’s room. She collapsed into the chair next to the bed. She wondered how Quinlan had such a nice place, but she figured he either broke in here and was taking advantage of the state the city was in or he had more money than he let on. It seemed likely some combination of the two. It seemed like a bad idea to pry into it.

“Your brother is a fucking dick,” she’d said that more than once. Charlie’s eyes drifted over to his face. It was unchanged. It was still more gray than she felt it should be. His eyes were closed and other than an occasional rattling noise from his chest, he was silent, “I wish you’d wake up already. You got me into all this shit, you should be awake to deal with it too.”

In a small fit, she lashed out and slapped her hand against his arm. It stung the palm of her hand and it didn’t get any kind of reaction out of him. Not that she fully expected to get one. He had been catatonic for some time now. Quinlan assured her that he wasn’t dead. She knew that, because his body was still warm, but it was cooler than it should have been, “Why didn’t I just leave? You gave me so many chances to go and I didn’t. I’m so...fucking...stupid.”

Was it wrong that this was the most stable relationship she’d ever had? Charlie didn’t love him. He was a monster. Maybe he had been born different from the way the others had been, but he wasn’t a human. She didn’t have those sort of feelings for him or for anyone really. Charlie had never really been close to anyone. She remembered others in her support group talking about how hard dating was and how hard it was to have a relationship. Charlie could never relate. She didn’t want a relationship. She didn’t feel attracted to people that way.

Maybe that was why she felt so close to Vaun now. He was like her in a way. She’d seen their bodies. He couldn’t be with a woman or a man even if he wanted to. It helped that he had tried with her in a way that others hadn’t before. He said he respected her. That wasn’t something she heard often. He brought her hygiene products and chocolate, because he thought he was being helpful. While it wasn’t helpful, it had been thoughtful. 

He’d even admitted while they were trapped in that lab that he had said those things to her and done those things for her because he knew she would come with him in the end. Worse, he hadn’t thought any of them would survive and he’d wanted her last days to be at least somewhat decent given the situation. That had angered her at first. That he thought they would all die, but he also said that he’d thought they would die succeeding. 

“You need to wake up. I can’t do this alone. We’re just replaceable canon fodder to your brother. He’s not even bothering to train the others,” Vaun had personally trained with herself and Gus. Quinlan admitted to only working with her. Those men, while terrible people who would probably gut her if they got the chance, were all going to die. He had no intentions of keeping to the promise she had heard he made to them. They were all going to die, “I don’t even know what he’s going to do with us,” Quinlan was even less forthcoming with information than Vaun had been. She supposed that was because deep down, neither of them really saw humans as needing that information.

“Please wake up…”


End file.
